Waiting
by weirdgirl42
Summary: After "Man in the Outhouse" Angela has a chat with Booth which leads him to have a chat with Bones.


_Author's Note: This takes place after "The Man in the Outhouse" and then skips to the end of "The Con Man in the Meth Lab." Makes references to both episodes that are kind of important. Enjoy._

**Waiting**

"You know why she does it right?"

Booth looked over and saw Angela walk up next to him on the balcony overlooking the lab. "Know why who does what?" he asked.

"Brennan. Going out with two guys, being so matter-of-fact about sex and relationships. I mean you get it right?"

"Angela, I can tell you in total honesty that I do not."

Angela turned so she was leaning sideways against the railing, facing him. "You, Booth. She's waiting for you."

Booth did a fairly good impression of a fish. "What are you talking about," he said at last. "Even if that were the case, which it's not, what she's doing is the exact opposite of waiting."

"Not for her."

Booth didn't know what to say. He looked down at the platform where Bones and her graduate student of the week were working on tissue markers. He watched her brush an errant strand of hair out of her face and thought, for about the millionth time since becoming partners, that she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever known.

"She's crazy about you Booth," Angela continued. "And that scares the crap out of her. Not to mention this line you apparently drew."

"I drew that line so we could stay partners."

"Who says you couldn't be partners in two different ways at the same time? No one here would say anything to anyone. Hell I wouldn't even tell Cam if you preferred. I think that after all you guys have been through recently, people would understand."

"I don't…she hasn't…she's always so clear with everyone that we're just partners. I always thought, at the end of the day, she just wasn't all that interested."

"Well it's like I said, you drew the line. And she respects you. She doesn't want you to leave her. That's her biggest fear you know, since everything that happened when you got shot, you leaving."

Booth was silent. Angela could see that he was having a hard time processing everything. She turned to walk away but was stopped by his voice.

"She seemed so mad at me," he whispered, staring straight ahead, not really looking at anything. "Mad that I had lied, or I guess that Sweets had lied. But she wasn't…she didn't seem relieved that I was alive. I mean I thought at first that was because she knew I wasn't but she didn't know. And she didn't seem sad that I was dead. She just moved on."

Angela took a breath. "I'm gonna break the best friend pact for a minute and tell you something she wouldn't want me to tell you." She shifted closer, speaking in a low voice. "Every night during the time you were dead, I would come and drag her out of the office and drive her home because that's the only way she would go home at all. And as soon as we were in the car, it was like the safety of work was gone and the tears would start.

"She cried every night Booth. I would get her into bed and she'd still be crying sometimes. She lost five pounds because she didn't eat unless someone forced her. And she would lie in bed and cry. She would repeat over and over again, 'It should have been me.' She knows what you did for her Booth. And she mourned you harder than I think she thought possible."

With that, Angela left him to his thoughts.

XXXXXXXXXX

He had been standing outside her door for ten minutes before he got up the courage to knock. She answered the door in pajama pants and a tank top, her hair pulled back into a ponytail (the way he secretly preferred it.)

"Hey what's going on?" she asked as she stepped aside to let him in. "It's after midnight."

"I saw your light on," he replied.

She gave a small smile. "Wow, déjà-vu. Except that this time you don't have Chinese food." When he didn't even crack a smile, she knew something was wrong. "Booth what is it? Is Parker alright? My dad? Angela?"

He mentally kicked himself for making her think the worst. "No nothing like that. Everyone's fine."

"Well then why…"

"I sat parked across the street every night for a week," he blurted out, cutting her off.

Brennan stared at him for a moment. "I don't know what…"

He interrupted her again. "When I was dead." A look of comprehension passed over her face but he just kept talking. "The first week I was in the hospital under guard. But after that they moved me to a safe house and at night I bribed the guard to drive me here. He would sit in the front seat doing a crossword puzzle while I stared up at your window. And every night I'd watch Angela bring you home and then she'd leave. But about half an hour after she left you would leave to go back to the damn lab. I mean, you couldn't even be sad about me for half an hour before doing your damn compartmentalizing!"

His rant now complete, he looked at her, his eyes finally coming to rest on her face. He was shocked to find tears running down her cheeks. He hadn't meant to yell at her. That wasn't his intention in going to her place. But seeing her there brought back all the memories of watching her leave each night. Of watching her be so stoic at his funeral. He hurt so bad that all of Angela's words were somehow absent from his mind. Now, however, they came flooding back.

Before he had a chance to apologize, she spoke. "For two weeks, Angela made the night guards at the Jeffersonian promise to call her if I tried to come back after being taken home." He voice was steady, despite the tears.

"For two weeks," she continued, "I would lie in my bed and all I could see was you being shot. All I could hear was the…was the gurgling sound your lungs made as you bled to death in my arms."

Booth moved towards her, reaching for her, but she backed away. Putting her hands up, almost in defense of his offered comfort, she walked into the kitchen with him following.

"So I would leave. Because it felt like my ears would never stop ringing with the sounds of screaming and that shot that should have hit me." Her tears were coming faster now and her breathing hitched slightly.

"And I would go to your apartment. Your apartment Booth. My car would just drive itself there." She shrugged, as though just resigning herself to telling him the truth. "I fed your fish. I watered your plants. And then I lay down on your bed and the feeling that you were somehow close by would make the ringing stop."

She ran her hand over her face and sobbed slightly. "You were dead Booth," she whispered. "And for two weeks I couldn't breathe. It felt like someone was kneeling on my chest. Then you were back, and Zack was a killer, and I couldn't deal with what he'd done because…because I couldn't deal with you being gone and then back. The center was gone and if the center can't hold, nothing holds."

Booth watched as she leaned back against the kitchen counter and slid down to the floor, sobs beginning to shake her body. He was at her side at once, coming to sit beside her and wrap her in his arms. He expected her to fight him but she did the opposite, burying her face in the soft fabric of his jacket she held on to him for dear life.

"I'm sorry," he said into her hair through his own tears. "I'm so sorry."

They stayed like that for a few minutes before Brennan extracted herself from Booth's arms and they sat against her kitchen cabinets side by side.

"You know that truth bubble thing Sweets is always going on about?" Booth asked.

"The zone of truth?"

Booth nodded. "Yeah. Can we have one of those in your kitchen for a minute?"

She looked at him slightly confused. "Booth there's always a zone of truth around us. Haven't the last fifteen minutes been evidence of that?"

"Actually I'd say that the last fifteen minutes has been evidence of us not being honest with each other."

"Being truthful and being honest about everything are totally different," Brennan argued.

"Fine," Booth said, too happy to have some of the old Bones back to really be frustrated with her arguments. "Well call it a 'cone of silence.' Like in Get Smart."

"I don't know what that means," she replied.

Booth sighed. "It's like we put a shield around the room and no one can hear what we say. It stays between us forever."

"There's no one else here," Brennan said. "No one will know what we say."

"Bones would you just go with me on this? We can't tell anyone either."

Brennan nodded her understanding and agreement.

"Okay," Booth said. "So nothing can get out of the cone. We can't even talk about it with each other unless the cone has been reestablished."

She wanted to argue that this cone idea seemed arbitrary and irrational, but she held her tongue and indicated for him to continue.

"I've always known in my heart," he began, "and before you tell me that it's impossible to know something in your heart, I want you to know that interrupting is not allowed in the cone of silence."

Brennan bit her lip to keep from smiling, and stayed quiet.

"Thank you," Booth said. "Anyway, I've known in my heart that someday being partners at work is going to become far less important than being partners in a different way. I know that there will come a day when I can't stand to look at you without knowing what it's like to kiss you without Caroline and mistletoe. What it's like to hold you when you sleep. I won't be able to handle looking at your face and not have the memory of trying to break the laws of physics and occupy the same space with you."

He looked over at her slightly stunned face and gently took her hand. "It is possible that somewhere inside, you know all this too?"

Brennan could do nothing but nod, a single tear running down her cheek. Booth reached up with his other hand and brushed it away. "Good," he said. "Then someday. Just not today."

They sat in silence for a while before Booth stood and headed to the door. Brennan followed and leaned against the hallway wall as he zipped up his jacket and opened the door. Before he left however, he leaned down and kissed her cheek. "I meant what I said in Sweet's office," he told her. "And I meant what I said in London. You're special, not them. You're special enough to wait for." And then, he was gone.

XXXXXXXXXX

They had been sitting in the bus shelter for ten minutes in total silence. Booth hadn't elaborated after stating that his father drank. He knew he didn't have to. The cake was gone now, but something was still weighing on Brennan's mind.

"Hey Booth?" she said.

"Yeah?"

"Can we have a cone of silence around the bus shelter?"

Booth felt his mouth twitch in the direction of a smile as he was filled with both anticipation and nervousness. "Sure Bones," he replied, still leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees so she couldn't see that he was somewhat terrified of what she would say next.

Brennan took a breath and placed a tentative hand on his back. "How much longer do we have to wait?" she asked in a low, almost timid voice.

Booth swallowed hard. He wished he could've been confused at her question. But her request for a cone of silence meant he knew exactly what she was talking about. When he didn't reply, she continued. "Your brother kissed me at the banquet." When she saw his head snap around she put up her hand. "No interrupting in the cone." She watched him take a breath and nod. "He kissed me. He said you would never take the risk. And I realized then, just how badly I want you to. Take that risk I mean. And after I got shot I couldn't help but wonder how many close calls and near misses we have left before one of us gets hurt for the last time.

She paused and took another breath. "I don't want to die without doing all those things you talked about in my apartment that night. Even if it means keeping it a secret, or not working together anymore. You're special too Booth, even if it doesn't always seem like I know that. You are. You're worth the risk, as I'm sure you'll be worth the wait we've already endured."

Booth finally leaned back against the glass and looked at her, trying to forget the sheer terror he's felt when he saw her get shot and the anger at his brother for doing the one thing he'd never been able to bring himself to do. They looked at each other for a moment before he spoke.

"You said, in there, that I'm an alpha male right?"

Brennan nodded.

"Are alpha males afraid to take risks?"

He was so close to her that he could feel the slight tremor that went through her body at their proximity.

"No," she whispered.

"That's what I thought," he said in the instant before he captured her lips with his.

Nothing either of them felt wasn't a huge cliché. She felt that nothing had ever been right before that moment, and he felt that his life was finally complete. But neither of them would ever admit to those thoughts, it would just sound silly.

When they finally pulled apart, both becoming aware that the whole lab was gathered in the bar only a few yards away, Booth rested his forehead against hers. "Let's get take out and watch a movie at my place," he said. "I think that would be the best birthday present ever."

Brennan frowned and pulled away.

"What?" Booth asked, a little scared. Maybe she thought inviting her to his place was too presumptuous.

"Well if I'd known that was what you wanted I would never have gotten you this." She pulled an envelope out of her pocket and handed it to him. He opened it and his eyes went wide. Two tickets to Hawaii and reservations at a hotel.

"Bones, no," he protested. "It's too much."

"Well what do you think is a better way to spend the ridiculous amount of money I've made writing books about us?"

Booth grinned. "So you admit that they're us?"

Brennan rolled her eyes. "If you say anything to anyone…"

He leaned down to kiss her against, now knowing that kissing Bones made him higher than that Christmas on anti-fungal drugs. And happy that he'd finally found a way to make her stop talking. "Thank you," he said.

"You're welcome."

"You're coming with me aren't you?"

Brennan looked surprised. "I figured you'd take Parker."

"Rebecca would never let him miss so much school." He nudged her good shoulder. "Come on. You, me, a tropical beach, fruity drinks with little umbrellas, a hotel suite." He wagged his eyebrows. "I'd make sure you always had sunscreen on your back."

Brennan smiled and shook her head at his antics. "How can I refuse an offer like that?"

"Trust me Bones," he said as he stood and held out a hand to her, "we haven't even scratched the surfaces of offers I make that you won't be able to refuse. As far as the two of us are concerned, I am the Godfather of good ideas."

Brennan took his hand and stood. "Hey I actually know what you're talking about."

Booth put an arm around her shoulder and kissed her temple, "That's nice Bones," he said.

**The End**

_Thanks for reading, please review!_


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